


It's the End of the World As We Know It (And I Feel Fine)

by AnonAlpaca



Category: Pocket Monsters | Pokemon - All Media Types, Pocket Monsters: Omega Ruby & Alpha Sapphire | Pokemon Omega Ruby & Alpha Sapphire Versions
Genre: Domestic, Domestic Bliss, Domestic Fluff, End of the World, Fluff and Hurt/Comfort, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Making Out
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-19
Updated: 2020-03-19
Packaged: 2021-02-28 19:21:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,537
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23212432
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AnonAlpaca/pseuds/AnonAlpaca
Summary: After finally settling down in Sinnoh's Celestic Town, Maxie and Archie are ready for a quiet life, and a quiet night, after an...eerily quiet day at work. But on top of the mountain just west of their house, Team Galactic has other ideas. Ideas which Maxie and Archie have never heard about before and actively don't want to worry about - until reality breaks.What else are you going to do when the world is falling down and you're hoping someone's going to fix it, but get comfortable?
Relationships: Aogiri | Archie/Matsubusa | Maxie
Comments: 2
Kudos: 31





	It's the End of the World As We Know It (And I Feel Fine)

Archie stood in front of the door, hands stuck rummaging aimlessly in his jacket pocket as he tried running through what exactly he’d done this morning, as the evening rain poured off the roof above the door with a vaguely annoying hiss. (You couldn’t say it was a light shower and you couldn’t say it was a thundering roar either. It was raining, and that was that.)  
  
He picked up the phone, he’d grabbed his backpack, he’d kissed Maxie goodbye, and…  
Something.  
No, he picked up the phone, he’d grabbed his backpack, he’d kissed Maxie goodbye, and...  
That was when he gave up and rang the doorbell; if his keys were somewhere he’d forgotten to check, he could do it later.  
“Coming - “  
Should do it later.

Telling himself automatically that this wasn’t the end of the world didn’t have...quite the same comfort to it today.  
  
“Hey,” he said with a smile that didn’t go all the way, as the door opened. Quickly, Maxie hurried him inside, having a quick look at their face as they made their way to the couch on autopilot - eyes half-closed, bags under his eyes.  
“Dear, you should’ve said you were working late…”  
“M’ phone died,” Archie explained, rubbing his bleary eyes and sprawling out on the couch, his bag slumped against the side of it, “Hope I didn’t worry you, what with all the...y’know.”  
“Oh, no, now I’m just thinking I should’ve made something - “ Maxie glanced over at the kitchen briefly, as he hopped onto the couch beside him. They’d dressed up in pyjamas already, they looked visibly more alive, too.  
“When’d you get back?...”  
“Lunchtime,” Maxie explained, resigned, “they...sent us all home.”  
Archie didn’t look all that surprised, no, but he covered his mouth with a hand, as he muttered a very quiet _‘oh no.’_  
“You know, it’s a library,” he explained, looking away, “a cultural spot, they’re worried those Galactic people might...try something soon. What with the manifesto they’ve just published, and...all that.”  
  
Both of them went silent for a second. The both of them knew exactly what they were talking about, they’d been told about it too many times to count.  
“Yeah, they tried to get _us_ to go home, too, but, y’know - “  
“ _Archie._ ”  
“I should’ve…”  
“Were you the only one there?“  
“More or less? Guy that takes care of the Pokemon, he’s been keeping track of that... _Cyrus_ guy this whole time, so he’s gone. Girl that runs the front-of-house, her family’s very Coronestian, so they’re - they’re all scared,” he listed, counting on his fingers, “Kid who’s keeping track of the online stuff, their family’s going out-of-town ‘till this blows over, so they’re leaving early anyway. And that just leaves...me and the manager.”  
  
“Oh, no wonder,” Maxie gasped, shuffling a little closer to Archie, “I’m guessing there can’t have been many people _in,_ but - still - “  
“Yeah, she kept trying to be like ‘oh, it’s okay if you’ve got more important places to be’ and I just felt...kind of awkward about it?” he explained, slowly and carefully piecing it all together, “I mean, the only reason _I’d_ be leaving is cause I’d be overworking myself. I...haven’t even been keeping track of the news - I don’t even know what this _‘Cyrus’_ guy wants - ”  
  
“Look, there’s no need to feel guilty about that,” Maxie reasoned, turning to him and making sure he had Archie’s full attention, “You said, you want to avoid stressful news now, and...my word, you’ve stuck to it. ...It’s not your responsibility. You just run the starter shop.”  
Archie smiled as what he’d just said poked through the brain fog - he let out a little laugh.  
“...My manager keeps saying we’re, uh... _a pillar of the community._ ”  
“Honestly,” Maxie scoffed, “every manager does that. I’d know.”  
“Oh, boy - “  
  
“Also, you’re not missing much, with that Cyrus person, he’s just...not very into _emotion_ . Or spirit, something like that. Apparently - “ he clarified, getting up to pace the living room, “he’s a bit of a recluse.”  
“Well...that’s just _sad._ ”  
“Isn’t it?” Maxie finished, picking up his phone, “Anyhow, we could...order some takeout? Save us the trouble?” Quickly, he tapped on the contact - he wasn’t sure what the name of the restaurant actually was, only that it was _‘the place with good rice bowls.’_  
He pressed it to his ear, listening to it ring as he kept pacing around the coffee table - once, twice, three times, four times - too many times.  
“Are they…”  
“They’ve just sent me to voicemail,” Maxie grumbled, ending the call, “I didn’t even know they _had_ a voicemail.”  
“They might’ve...left work too.”  
...Maxie froze.  
  
“I - Oh. The pizza place, then?”  
“Well...funny story,” Archie almost laughed, “apparently they were a front?”  
“ _Excuse_ me?”  
“Yeah, the owners just upped and left for Mt. Coronet today,” he kept explaining, “though, bear in mind, this is coming from the guy who…”  
He trailed off. Maxie had gone ghostly pale.  
...He’d been rambling about this so long in a tired stream of consciousness that he’d forgotten how serious this actually was.  
  
“Why didn’t I - why don’t any of _my_ co-workers tell me these fucking things?” Maxie snapped under his breath, deleting the pizza place from his list of contacts, “I...suppose I should’ve guessed,” he sighed -  
“I think you said _something_ about their bowlcuts once.”  
“Oh, and _then_ I decided I was being paranoid,” Maxie concluded, before he drew a probably well-needed deep breath, “...sorry. Sorry.”  
“Hey, it’s okay....”

  
“We can still make dinner here,” he decided, holding out a hand and helping Archie up regardless of whether their legs worked or not, “or...I could. If you’re too tired.”  
“Nah, I’ll come,” Archie replied, walking over with him to the kitchen and putting his phone on charge, “I could...probably use a distraction, to be honest.”  
“You know what?” Maxie continued, his genuine smile back, “Fair enough. Absolutely fair enough. Also, there’s that Slowpoke tail we need to use up…” Then Archie flicked the oven onto a high heat, with a screeching, juddering noise as it started up before it faded to a gentle hum. Step one, he knew that much.”  
“Right! Now, what do we make?”  
_That_ was where Archie’s train of thought found it didn’t have any more rail, and right now he didn’t have the energy to make any new ones.  
  
“...Uhh,” he muttered, “hmm.”  
Maxie tilted his head.  
“I’m blanking on what food is.”  
“That’s fine, dear,” Maxie replied without a pause, “I’ll work something out, then. Just...stop me if you’ve got anything you’d like to pepper in.” Then, without a pause again, he gave Archie a peck on the cheek.  
  


* * *

  
What Maxie was going to make, he didn’t exactly know either; he just knew it was easier for one to say ‘ _fuck it’_ and throw the potatoes and the carrots in the same pan as the chicken when one had been working a three-hour shift. Archie worked with the less decision-heavy parts of it, making sure the pot didn’t boil over and the carrots weren’t undercooked, adding in a few bits of rosemary and pepper when he felt like it. (The pepper felt like an obvious choice.) He had to ask a couple of times where he’d left it last, but other than that, he could just...zone out while he watched the pot. In a good way.  
  
There was the less annoying drumming of the rain on the window. The little splash as he drained out the boiling water, the cloud of steam that woke him up a little.  
Then there was Maxie, glasses off and with his pyjamas on, still looking genuinely nice. And if there was one thing he could do when Archie wanted to, it was talk.  
  
“So...that’s why I poured the entire packet of paprika on top of the roast once my mother turned around,” Maxie was explaining as he put the dinner into the oven, “of course, I’m - I’m assuming your parents didn’t end up liking it as much as I thought they would…”  
“Never heard about it from them,” Archie suggested, “I dunno if they ever found out it was you?”  
“Oh, they absolutely did. They looked right at me,” Maxie retorted, miming it with his hand as he knocked the oven door closed, “Alright, that should be done in...half an hour!”  
Quickly, he dusted his hands off (they were clean) and leaned back against the counter beside Archie, still smiling to himself. He’d already set a little timer on his phone.  
  
“I’m assuming you...don’t want to watch the news, tonight,” Maxie asked him, softly. His cheeks were flushed bright red, and Archie didn’t know whether it was from the steam or the blush.  
“...Nah.”  
Either way, they both looked fantastic - considering.  
“...I’ve _technically_ got a bit of paperwork to do,” Maxie kept explaining at a mile a minute, still facing forward and looking out the window as he counted on his fingers, “but - I can definitely ignore that, so I... _might_ just join you and do nothing…”  
  
And then he looked back around, to see Archie gazing at him - clearly lost in something but it definitely wasn’t his thoughts. Maxie forgot what he was saying for a brief moment, wondering if there was something crucial he’d forgotten to talk about.  
Either there was something on his shirt, or Archie was glancing at his lips.  
  
So he leaned in for a kiss and let Archie close the gap, with more of a fond smile than ever - feeling Archie wrap his arms around his waist, as his beard tickled against Maxie’s cheek like the rough, warm fluff of a towel.  
“Oh - “  
Maxie teetered backwards for a moment as Archie leaned slightly towards him - together, still without saying a word, they tried to get away from the kitchen and to somewhere more comfortable, in a strange kind of four-legged race to something they could safely fall onto without hurting their back and probably breaking the mood. When Archie finally found a seat on the arm of the couch, he pulled away for a second or two -  
  
Maxie looked positively miffed, before Archie planted a kiss on his forehead.

“You know, I quite like it when you’re...not very _subtle._ ”  
“I, uh...don’t see the point of it,” Archie replied, steadying himself, “...Not right now, anyway.”  
“Of course not - “ Maxie chuckled to himself, flushed bright red from ear-to-ear by this point and hardly able to string a few words together - and he pulled Archie back in himself for another kiss before he could get a reply. Not exactly a _soft_ kiss this time, but Archie knew very well by this point that Maxie didn’t like to leave a kiss until he was completely breathless.  
  
...Archie deserved this much, he was sure of that right now. He kicked off his boots, with a little bit of effort. By now the sun was setting outside, and the living room had turned a little more shady, moody than it had five minutes ago. (Not that he didn’t like it.)  
  
Maxie didn’t notice at first when a hand slipped up his loose pyjama shirt - he was a little bit preoccupied, but he did notice when Archie pulled him forward a tiny bit, and the weight shifted to the left...and with a soft thump, Archie topped off the arm of the couch, dragging Maxie on the seat with him.  
  
By this point they were in a tangled heap - Archie leaning back against the tacky pile of cushions on one side and Maxie leaning into him, half-lying and half-kneeling on the couch seat.  
The couch wasn’t exactly designed for this. If they ever earned enough to pay for some _new_ furniture, Archie mused as Maxie paused for breath, they were going to get one of those nice, thick, pull-out sofa beds. Imagine that, the luxury -  
  
And then the mood lighting was ruined.  
Archie looked up and noticed how the entire left half of Maxie’s face was lit up in neon pink. From here he could see their TV, suddenly displaying nothing but a checkerboard pattern of bright magenta and pure black.  
...He hadn’t even turned it on.  
Reluctantly, Maxie pulled away from the kiss to see what Archie was so confused by. He raised an eyebrow as he craned his neck around, slightly annoyed by the TV’s lack of timing.  
  
“Must’ve...sat on the remote,” Archie concluded, fishing out the hunk of plastic that had been poking at the small of his back as he sat up.  
“Ahh! That makes sense.”  
Maxie plucked the remote right out of his hands, inspected it for a moment, then promptly threw it clean across the room.  
  
“We’ll worry about that later, shall we?” he suggested, talking at a mile a minute.  
“Ach, yeah,” Archie replied, with a toothy grin and flushed cheeks, still trying to see where the remote had flown to - oh well, there wasn’t a loud crashing noise and breaking of glass _this_ time, so it can’t have been anything bad. Besides, Maxie had that slightly mischievous look plastered on his face, waiting for Archie’s full attention.  
He took the cue, and relaxed completely.  
Then with one swift movement, Maxie dug his knees into the gap between the cushions, pounced like a cat, and pinned Archie to the couch by his forearms -  
  
Something _broke._  
It wasn’t the couch, and it wasn’t Archie’s back either; Maxie knew far better than to do that.  
  
It was something a lot _less_ specific, like the pair of them had mentally skipped on a record at the exact same time. The both of them froze. The room went from a soft twilight to pitch black.  
...Apparently, the lights had broken too.  
  
And then Maxie had a thought, that only he and the person he had currently pinned to the couch could _possibly_ have.  
“Did...did I do that?” he whispered.  
“I dunno, man,” Archie gasped, still out of breath -  
Then, with an audible crackling, flickering noise like a radio out of tune, the entire room lit up a pure red, blue and green. Every part that the moon was shining onto a few seconds ago now looked like a kaleidoscope.  
“No. No, I couldn’t have...”  
The wind and rain outside had gone deathly quiet, and Maxie was still weighing up the pros and cons of letting go of Archie. Either his heart was thumping because of the obvious otherworldly lights or it was telling him to go back to whatever he was doing.  
“Should we maybe…”  
“Check that?” Maxie finished hurriedly, untangling himself and unsteadily getting up to his feet, “Yes, yes, of course.“  
  
Leaving the couch a mess of squashed cushions, they both ran over to the front door side by side, watching their step as they crossed from pitch black shadows to brightly painted lights that hid the steps and rugs - neat and stretched spots of red, blue, green, red...  
A shiver finally ran down Maxie’s spine.  
_It’s okay,_ he tried to tell himself, _police lights don’t have green in them._ _  
_ _  
_ With a click, Archie stepped ahead, turned the door handle, peered through the gap and saw...absolutely nothing.  
“The...door doesn’t _work_ ,” Archie stated in a monotone.  
  
Quite literally - nothing.  
He looked left and right, opening the door wide - either it was completely pitch black outside, or there wasn’t anything there to _be_ painted pitch black. Head spinning, heart sinking, he slowly looked downwards. His feet were firmly planted to the perfectly lit floor inside. Maxie’s arm wrapped tightly around his.  
Their faded red doormat floated in mid air. (If there was air.)  
“I...see what you mean,” Maxie stuttered, as Archie hurriedly pulled him back from the drop with a muttered _‘careful.’_ He slammed the door, locked it, and stepped very...very far away.  
  
Slightly more cautiously now, Maxie led them both over to the window above the stairs. They watched their steps, the way what little light there was played on everything they could trip on. Still sticking by one another, they crossed back through the living room, casting striking shadows on the walls as they did, twice as tall as they were.  
One glance through the door when they were halfway upstairs told Archie that their _bedroom_ definitely wasn’t gone. ...Why was that?  
  
One glance out the window didn’t give him any more comfort.  
He joined Maxie at the windowsill and clasped his hand tight, their faces both lit up in sickly bright colours as they stared out into what was, apparently, their backyard. Raindrops clung like ice to the window, even the biggest ones weren’t slipping down it - past that, still more raindrops and sleet clung to the _air._  
And past those, you could see pine trees stuck tussling with now non-existent wind.  
“Hold on,” Maxie whispered, grabbing a pen from his pocket, “I’ll just...“  
With a grating creak, he shoved the windows open -  
“Wait, wait!”  
“I’m just - testing,” he explained, shuffling to the side a little so he could get a better view - and with a flick, the pen flew out of his hand, out the window, out into the night...and right into a patch of half-melted snow.  
“Well...I’m not getting that back ‘till spring, am I?...” Maxie whispered in a shaky voice.  
He couldn’t see it anymore, even with his glasses on.  
“Holy shit.”  
He pushed his arm out into the rainstorm, his fingers first then his whole hang. Hanging on tight to the windowsill, he leaned out into the open air. Slowly at first he waved his hand through the swarm of raindrops, then faster, up and down, side to side, and each time he did he was sure he’d be able to feel it on his skin by now. He’d touched them - or should’ve. Several times.  
  
...Quickly, he snatched his hand back.  
“What even...is that?” Archie muttered, leaning out alongside him and still keeping a very firm grip on Maxie’s waist, “There.”  
The pair of them turned their heads up, together.  
“My _word._ ”  
Red, blue and green spots stretched across the entire sky, in that exact order, repeating, repeating, and repeating. Pure enough and bright enough and close enough to each other to make Archie’s sight go blurry - his eyes had no idea where to focus. Everything had less depth, if he moved his head from side to side. Less something.  
“It’s like - “  
There was no moon, no clouds, no nothing.  
“It looks like one of those old phone screens, actually,” he described as the idea popped into his head, “when you get up...close…”  
  
Archie trailed off, as soon as he realised what he was actually implying.  
  
“You don’t suppose we’re…” Maxie said after he’d torn himself away from the window, arms wrapped tight around himself, “that we’re the only ones who aren’t _frozen?_ ”  
Archie wasn’t following him.  
“If _we’re_ able to move out there, but - the rain can’t…”  
“No. No, we can’t be,” Archie told him, only slightly turning around, “there’s no reason we’d be fine, and everyone else everywhere...wouldn’t be.”  
“But - why?” Maxie squeaked.  
Archie shuddered. ...The sky looked so uniform. Look too hard at it and he could see _perfectly_ straight lines between the blocks of color, drawn all the way from him to the horizon.  
Those didn’t exist. Not in nature.  
  
“I don’t know,” he whispered, almost not wanting to let Maxie hear.  
Either he was entirely wrong about nature or this wasn’t nature at all.  
  
“We’ll just...wait then,” Maxie asked, tugging Archie back inside by the shoulder as he gulped, “Yes, we’ll wait,” he continued, talking to himself by this point, “we’ll do that. We’ve got food, we’ve got water, we could last about a week, I'm sure...”  
With a little more conviction now, he gently guided Archie’s head away from the window. He didn’t meet much resistance as he turned them around, and as soon as Archie couldn’t see the pretty lights anymore - they closed their eyes, just to be safe.  
“...Just...try not to think about it, dear,” Maxie told him, a hand on his cheek, “I’m here.”  
Without opening his eyes, Archie slowly raised a hand to hold Maxie’s there. He could focus on the touch, that was...easy enough to do right now.  
  


* * *

  
Priority number one was making the house secure. Nothing could technically get in, apart from the bright light, of course, Archie thought to himself as he tugged another set of curtains tightly closed - all he had to know was that he didn’t want to deal with it. Or shouldn’t.  
Then again, a part of him wanted to linger at each window before he closed it off. He’d been cut off the last time, that was it. Willingly, mind you. Would it take self-restraint to keep looking out there a little longer and try and figure it out before - _something_ happened or...would it take self-restraint to give up?  
“Now that you say it,” Maxie was rambling, not leaving a second without a word said, “I should - we should really go and get some decent blinds and get rid of those old musty curtains, next time I get paid…”  
“Oh, yeah?”  
“One of those nice fabric-y ones - not one of the wooden ones; they’ll rattle…”

  
Archie closed one final pair of curtains by the stairs - he turned around, and saw that their living room was...actually _theirs_ again, to put it simply. Almost entirely pitch black and starting to get cold, mind you. But...you could mistake it for a power cut. If you tried.  
Well, apart from the TV, that was still on.  
“I - why isn’t it…”  
  
Best not to overthink it.  
“You alright?” Archie asked softly - Maxie kept pacing around the living room, slightly hunched over the dim screen of his phone, only looking up for a moment to see Archie was following him. Still, he slowed down a tiny bit.  
“...Yes, it’s just - you’d think we’d have _heard_ from someone by now,” he explained quietly, sitting down on the couch again and holding his head in his hands. Gingerly he set the phone down on the coffee table facing up, nudging it a little more within reach.  
“If they’re all in...the same state we are. Not frozen.”  
Archie tossed his coat over the screen of the broken TV, as he thought for a moment.

  
“I - hmm. ...Maybe it’s not part _of_ this?” he suggested, sitting down beside Maxie and resting a hand on his shoulder, “I mean, everyone’s gonna be trying to send texts all at once, that always happens.” He gave it a little squeeze.  
Slowly, Maxie looked up and turned the volume on his phone all the way to the top. He flipped it over for good measure, before he collapsed onto the back of the couch, exhausted.  
“Ah, I just hope it isn’t any more... _complicated_ than that _,_ ” he muttered, “I don’t - _get_ it.”  
  
“...Come here,” Archie told him, wrapping his arms around them, pulling them close as they got to their feet, “it’s okay. We don’t have to, you said…”  
“I _know_ , I know.”  
Archie felt Maxie cling onto him a little tighter as he spoke.  
  
“I’m still...frightened,” Maxie admitted very, very quietly. The voice came out as a high-pitched croak, and Archie felt a few tears prick at his eyes.  
  
“Me too, alright?” he clarified, suddenly aware of how his heart thumped, “I’m just...hoping it doesn’t _mean_ anything, y’know? Like, if this has anything to do with universes or... _spirit_ and...“  
“Someone - someone very clever’s going to work this all out,” Maxie tried to say, giving himself a trembly-voiced pep talk with an audience of one, “and it’ll all just be...another _stupid_ thing a stupid man tried to do. And - we’re both sticking this out ‘till it’s _over,_ ” he added on, his mouth suddenly dry.  
Archie paused for a moment, as he took it all in.  
“At least, I...hope we can.”  
“We’ve done it before, technically,” Archie whispered, and he heard Maxie, very faintly...laugh. A single, sharp and quiet chuckle. Probably a bit bitter. ...He wasn’t aware that was meant to be funny somehow, but as he thought about it more, it made a lot of sense - in that it was so nonsensical. Slowly, Maxie buried his head in Archie’s chest again.  
Gently, silently, they swayed slightly from side to side. Archie cradled the back of Maxie’s head with his hand as they did, stroking it with his thumb from time to time.  
  
...And then someone’s phone rang.  
“Is that - “  
“Good gracious, already?”  
“Wait, wait, no,” Archie stuttered, “that’s just mine…”  
“Oh, didn’t you - “  
“Yeah, I set the alarm for…”  
Both of them paused for a second and glanced over at the now very dim-looking kitchen.  
  
“Well, we can’t just…” Maxie wondered aloud, “not _eat_ it _,_ now can we?”  
“You know what, you’re right,” Archie continued, making his way over to the oven, “I...think we could try and go back to the plan of, uh, doing nothing all evening…”  
“Oh, it’s not like we’re going anywhere, now, are w - “  
_Thump._  
Maxie winced.  
“ _Fffffff_ ** _fff_** \- “ Archie hissed, his big toe still stuck on the side of the kitchen counter. Leaning unsteadily on the top of it, he tried hopping backward with one foot in the air - well, until he felt someone dash over, catch him and bring him back upright.  
“Hold on, dear,” Maxie called, scurrying over to where he thought the light switch was. Archie heard the sound of him flicking it on. And then flicking it off. And then flicking it on and off and on and off and on.  
“ _Bloody_ hell,” he snapped, punching the light switch on a whim before scurrying back over to Archie, as he took the tray out of the still-warm oven, keeping his weight off his stubbed toe. He stuck a small knife into the Slowpoke tail, peeling back the beige outer layer and finding it a pale pink on the inside. The potatoes looked fine, the carrots a little over-firm if he poked them.  
  
“...Yeah, it’s not cooked all the way through,” he decided, putting the tray on the counter, “and...oh, the fridge isn’t gonna be working either, is it…” (Maxie kept grumbling incoherently.)  
Archie sighed, deeply, and that was all. Normally, this was supposed to be something you would immediately panic over.  
“I mean, I suppose we could just...have _toast,_ ” he suggested in a monotone, still glancing at the very nice-looking Slowpoke tail, “Wait, no. ...Bread.”  
Maxie wandered off to the living room again feeling somehow thoroughly cheated, resisting the temptation to harrumph indignantly as he watched his step. The only thing that could make this possibly worse if he went the way Archie did and stubbed his toe on the -  
“Wait.”  
The _fireplace._  
“A-ha!” Maxie exclaimed, clapping his hands together, “Archie! I’ve got it!”  
“Yeah?”  
“We have a _fireplace!_ ”  
“Ohhh,” Archie gasped, his face lighting up again, “and you’ve got Cindy…”  
“We can still have _toast!_ ”  
Archie tilted his head.  
“...What?”  
He motioned towards the half-cooked Slowpoke tail, sitting on the counter.  
  
“Ahhhh,” Maxie gasped as his face went from confused to stunned to delighted, “Archie, you are a _genius._ ”  
“I - “ he stuttered at first, bringing the tray over, “why, thankyou…”  
  
First they woke up Cinderbar and gave her a quick rundown of why everything was so dark, and quiet, and all the curtains were shut - well, as simple an explanation as they could, complete with a lot of petting and soothing coos from both Maxie and Archie. Then Archie piled the fireplace up high with whatever dusty old logs they had lying nearby and the newspapers they’d read right through. Maxie kept encouraging Cinderbar as they tried again and again to light it all up with embers - and after what felt like an age, something finally caught.  
  
Archie ran back over with a long metal skewer they barely ever used, poking it through the Slowpoke tail until he could be fairly sure it wouldn’t fall through. Then he got comfortable, holding it steady over the crackling fire. (Cinderbar kept trying to steal his spot, but Maxie eventually persuaded her to move with some of the carrots.)  
  
“I should...really try lighting this more often, you know,” Maxie commented, as he curled up on the carpet like Cinderbar was, “it’s...nice to look at.”  
“Bit less expensive, too,” Archie pointed out.  
“Mm.”  
“...Unless you really fuck it up,” he added quietly, with a smirk - Maxie chuckled to himself and muttered a soft _‘oh, but I wouldn’t’_ under his breath. His arm started aching a little, then, and Maxie took the skewer from him.  
Cinderbar looked up for a moment, drawn to the lit up windows they could see in the corner of their eye - and for a Camerupt, they’d assume anything in the corner of their eye could be something nasty. It rose to its feet and shook its head with a deep moo, sending dander into the air like a cloud of dust. Like clockwork, Archie sneezed and Maxie jumped.  
  
“You alright, dear?”  
“Yeah, it’s a’ight,” he replied, with a slightly stuffy nose, “Cindy’s…”  
  
Halfway through his sentence, the whole house shook with a boom like thunder. Kicking at the carpet with her hooves, Cinderbar almost took off down the living room -  
“Hey, hey, it’s alright, it’s...just a storm,” Archie whispered, scrambling in front of them before they could startle, trying to avoid eye contact, holding his hands out -  
Did they know? Had they learned to associate ‘thunder’ with the non-existent rain?  
They’d stopped anyhow, they seemed to believe him.  
  
“Here,” Maxie offered, as Cinderbar gingerly knelt back down. Stretching his hand out so the skewer was still over the fire, he tried to get his face in full view - not the corner of her eye, she hated people popping in there - and with his one free hand, he stroked the top of her forehead and shushed her.  
“I’ll take it,” Archie told him, easing the Slowpoke tail out of his hand.  
“We’re safe in here,” Maxie was busy saying to Cinderbar in an almost sing-song kind of rhythm, “We’ve closed the curtains, we’ve closed the door. Nothing’s coming in.”  
Their eyes fluttered half-closed, and Cinderbar started taking deep, noisy breaths again. Without any sudden movements, Maxie carefully slipped out of their field of view and joined Archie again, by the fire.  
  
“That sounded...far enough away,” Maxie said to himself.  
At this point he’d gotten used to the crackling noise of the fire. Every now and then he thought he heard another clap of thunder when he blocked out that white noise, but every time he seemed to be imagining it.  
“...Do you hear that?”  
The more he concentrated, though, the more he could hear a faint...droning noise.  
“What is it?”  
Electronic. _Definitely._ _  
_  
“Wait, that’s...probably just the fridge or something. Ignore me.”  
Archie understood it when he heard something they couldn’t -  
“No, no, I hear that…”  
Never mind.  
“I...thought the power was out?”  
“...Oh,” Maxie’s eyes darted around the room - even when he pressed one and then both his hands tight to his ears he could still _hear_ it. He could pinpoint it now - the hum of an old TV, but how on earth could...  
  
“Hang on,” Archie suggested with a slightly raised voice, passing the skewer back to Maxie as he rushed to get his phone, “We’ll...get some music on - 21%, that should last us…”  
If Maxie couldn’t un-listen to it, _he_ certainly couldn’t either.  
  
“Yes. Perfect.“  
“Here we go - _‘white noise,’_ ” he explained, turning the volume all the way up - and so, the electronic droning was replaced with...a slightly different electronic hum.  
“...wait.”  
“It’s alright, take your time - “  
“Hang on, I’ll, uh...see what’s in here,” Archie continued, having a look at Maxie’s dusty, old reliable boombox on the bookshelf, and pressing play - with a soft whirr, it started back up as he brought it down to the floor. Maxie always had good taste in music, he knew that.  
  
‘ - outside the window, as I look around the room, and it makes me so depressed to see the glooom! _There’s not a soul out there!_ ** _No-one to hear my prayeeeer -_** ‘  
Oh.  
“Hm?” Maxie piped up, leaning back, halfway through silently belting out the last lines before he quickly snapped back to attention, “Wait, don’t you like… _oh._ Oh, I see the problem.”  
“Nah, I like ‘em quite a bit.” (Maxie went bright red.)  
  
“Well, if we’re looking for something... _loud_ ,” he suggested, still with a sheepish smile, getting out his phone and letting Archie take the skewer, “I’ve got my running playlist here?”  
“A’ight…” (Archie’s finger was still hovering over the ‘play’ button on the boombox, but he pushed it to the side - carefully, though, the thing was practically an antique.)  
  
‘ - world serves its own needs, listen to your heart bleed, tell me with the rapture and the reverent in the right, right…’  
“There, see?”  
‘You patriotic, vitriolic, slam fight, bright light, feeling! _Pretty!_ ** _Psyched!_** _It’s the end of the wooorld as we know it!...It’s the end of the wooorld as we know it!..._ ’  
Archie almost fell over laughing.  
‘ _It’s the end of the wooorld as we know it...and I feel fine!_ ...Six ‘o clock, T.V hour, don’t get caught in foreign tower, slash and burn, return, listen to yourself churn - ‘  
“ _How_ is that...“ Maxie muttered -  
  
“I mean, it - it kind of _works…”_ Archie decided, once he was done chuckling to himself.  
“You think so?” Maxie’s finger paused, right over ‘pause.’  
“Yeah?” they continued, taking the Slowpoke tail out from the fire and sliding it onto the tray, “I guess if it were more… _’it’s the end of the world as we know it and...I feel like shit,’_ it wouldn’t, but this, it’s...nice.”  
Admittedly, Maxie took a second or two to understand what they were getting at.  
“Also, I think the tail’s ready.”  
  
_‘Birthday party, cheesecake, jellybean, boom, you symbolic, patriotic, slam but neck, right, right-’_  
But he knew a genuine smile from Archie when he saw it. So he nodded and turned the music all the way back up - and admittedly, he felt fine as well. In fact, he’d almost forgotten why he put on the music in the first place, and that he was very much content with.  
“Who’s Leonard Bernstein, though?...” Archie muttered to himself as he cut up the tail.  
“No clue.”  
  
By now the fire was dying down a little, from a bright yellow to a dim orange. Archie poked at it a tiny bit with the skewer, sending a few sparks into the air and nothing more; he felt like he should’ve looked up the basics of fire-lighting beforehand. (Well, if the internet wasn’t shot.)  
...But he was _definitely_ going to try this again.  
“Here - I’ll take that part,” Maxie offered, lifting the charred side of the tail onto his plate before tucking in - the meat was a little cooler on the inside than the scalding outside, but he could ignore that. The signature sea-salty taste he’d heard about was still there. When he saw the definitely free-range stuff again, he’d get it. Definitely.  
  
_‘It’s the end of the world as we know it...and I feel fine.’_  
The room went silent again for a second after the final guitar chord, but part of the - what he _thought_ was just part of the instrumental kept humming. At least it was a little comfort to know that this time, Archie could definitely hear it too.  
  
Maxie leaned up against him, as the fire slowly dimmed.  
“...You know, dear, I’d call that a success,” he muttered, softly.  
  


* * *

  
There were only so many things they could do to distract themselves, after that. Sure, they could probably drag out a board game or a pack of cards, re-light the fire, turn up the music, get the dishes in the dishwasher, they _technically_ could.  
Distracting Archie took effort, energy, and by this point he knew this.  
“Alright, Cinderbar,” Maxie was saying to someone, very far away, “you can stay in our room tonight, but - but you can’t get on the bed, alright? Right.”  
_Plates, fork, the one skewer, the tray - the plates, the foil_ , his instinct kept saying that he might’ve forgotten something, he just didn’t know what exactly, other than _somehow_ forgetting about the very obvious lightshow going on outside. Just past the curtains, right in front of him.  
He’d resisted the temptation to take another look several times, he could do it again.  
  
...It happened when he got back up from loading the dishwasher and looked to his left. Something fell out of sync - he blinked. He moved his head quickly to the left again, and this time, now he was properly paying attention, he’d tell you he saw a strip of his view fail to catch up with the rest for a second. A _perfect_ horizontal strip - oh, but those didn’t exist.  
...He’d told himself that twice now.  
  
He raised his hand in front of his face and waved it; nothing happened.  
“Hm?” Maxie called, running over to him, “what’s going on?”  
But as soon as he moved his head to the side - he could see it clearly. A strip of his hand and the blurry wall behind it and the blurry _Maxie_ in front of him. All lagging behind.  
“Archie - “  
Something was wrong with him.  
“Do you - do you see that...thing? When you turn your head around too fast, and it…” he explained as Maxie’s eyes widened, hoping and praying that he’d explained it in enough detail. He didn’t want to try it again. He shouldn’t.  
...Maxie didn’t know what to do, other than raise his hand up to where Archie’s was.  
“Yes, I...see that too. Definitely.”  
And he heard an audible sigh of relief.  
“Good gracious _,_ ” Maxie continued under his breath.

  
Carefully he took Archie’s hand and brought it back down to his side, clasping it very, very tightly and trying not to move his head too quick as he turned to them. For a second or so...Archie looked right past him. Or through. Then he visibly shook himself back to his senses and gripped Maxie’s hand, still with the same look in his eyes.  
  
“We should try and _sleep_ , alright?” Maxie concluded, hurriedly taking Archie to the stairs, arm wrapped around his waist, “And - and not stay here.”  
“ _That_ \- yeah…” Archie whispered to himself, trying to shut his eyes already, “...we should, like, right now,” he added, as Maxie pushed open their bedroom door. The whole room was dimly lit by the lava in Cinderbar’s humps - they jumped to their hooves for a second before realising who it was that was coming into the room and slipping into bed.  
  
“Comfy?” Maxie asked him, poking into every nook and cranny of the room to try and find extra cushions, pillows, even extra blankets they weren’t going to dig out until midwinter and piling them around the bed, making space for Archie and an empty spot for him.  
“Are you...making a pillow fort?” Archie murmured.  
“Yes. Bit of extra security.”  
“It’s okay, I’m not…”  
  
“Well, either way I’d feel more comfortable with one too,” Maxie clarified quickly, digging through his desk drawers, “rather than just - leaving it be, you know? Anyway, I’ve found us some…”  
He froze for a second, he’d whipped his head around too quickly.

“...some sleep masks. Here, catch,” he finished, tossing one to Archie.  
“Oh, yeah, this’d work great, actually…” Archie said, putting it on, “can’t exactly be... _seeing_ things if I can’t see…” The bed rocked and creaked slightly - Archie could tell Maxie just slid in beside him, without even having to look. Before he could even ask Maxie to, they’d wrapped their arms around him and pulled him close to their chest.  
“I’ll be right here,” he reassured them, giving him a kiss to make sure he got the message, “I promise.”  
“Mm.”  
  
The old strategy of counting heartbeats would still work now.  
_Thump-thump, thump-thump._  
If he took it out of any and all context, this could just be another one of his bad nights.  
_Thump-thump, thump-thump._  
He’d felt unsure about almost everything before.

 _Thu- Thump-thump -_  
Was he falling asleep now or - something else? Sleep felt like mentally skipping on a record, didn’t it? Of course, he couldn’t remember it, you don’t _remember_ that part, but...clearly it wasn’t just _him_ , since Maxie had suddenly tugged the duvets up to cover them both completely.  
_The man’s onto something,_ Archie thought.  
“Maxie?” he whispered -  
“Mm?”  
“...I love you.” he said.  
  
“I - “ Maxie stuttered, clinging onto Archie a little tighter and flicking up his sleep mask, “No, no, don’t do that _yet._ “  
“Do what?”  
“I love you too, but it’s - it’s not like the world’s ending for _good_ , now, is it...“  
“Hey, hey, I know. I know. ...I just wanted to say, you’ve been...great company tonight,” Archie replied, softly and...well, almost calmly. There was still a lump in his throat. But almost calmly was enough as he pulled Maxie in close as well, resting a hand on the back of their head and letting their foreheads touch -  
Gingerly, wordlessly, Maxie copied him. The mask slipped back down.  
“Thankyou.”  
And he went back to the old strategy of listening to each breath in, and breath out. He’d already figured out that they were a lot more regular than heartbeats, when he - _they_ kept losing a second each time they closed their eyes (or maybe they never did) - he could focus on the soft, rhythmic breathing. The details weren’t important, not anymore.  
  
They didn’t know how long it took for them to finally fall asleep for good. For one, when Archie saw that his clock was reading 00:00 he quickly turned it around - he called it ‘creepy,’ and fair enough to him. For another, time goes thankfully fast when you’re bundled up in a cocoon. And the both of them definitely shut down into either _sleep_ , or something else. Why at the exact same time, you’d wonder? Well - that happened on most nights, whether reality had broken or not.  
  
But there was one thing that they both remembered faintly when they woke up from whatever was, before they slipped back into a proper, deserved sleep...  
The rain started again, right where it left off.  
  


* * *

  
Maxie always resisted the urge to come back from his morning walks in the nearby forest with a whole pile of not-very-good firewood carried over his shoulder, as rugged and resourceful as it’d make him look. But he had a decent excuse for today. (And then for the next, and the next.)  
Work at the library was still called off; that _‘Cyrus’_ person had mysteriously disappeared and...well, he _supposed_ the logic was that some careless grunt might retaliate. (They wouldn’t. Generally teams like that collapsed without the man in charge, he knew that.)  
“Hey, love!” Archie called from their yard.  
  
...And he wasn’t in the mood to sit there with his laptop, reading endless explanations for whatever happened last night. He could narrow down his priorities. So, balancing a few branches on one shoulder and trying not to slip on the damp leaves and slick roots, he replied to everyone’s texts one by one - all of them came through around the same time. (Thank goodness he wasn’t awake for _that_ cacophony.)  
  
_Matt 2:03 AM:_ [ BRO ARE YOU SEEING THIS]  
_Tabitha 2:03 AM:_ [ you okay over there? ]  
_Tabitha 2:03 AM:_ [ oh wait it’s not going through is it ]  
_Tabitha 2:03 AM:_ [ stay safe man, hope this gets to you xx ]  
  
God, he loved them all.  
  
_Shelly 2:03 AM:_ [ is your phone working?? ]  
_Courtney 2:03 AM:_ [ i lived bitch ]  
  
He sighed in relief; Archie must’ve been right in his earlier guess after all. Maxie looked up and saw them waving from the yard, so he sped up a tiny bit - a few branches and sticks fell behind him, but he didn’t mind that.  
Archie seemed to have the same idea he did, holding his phone in one hand and a shovel in the other - Maxie kissed him on the cheek and Archie did the same.  
“How’s everyone holding up?”  
“Oh, they did great,” he replied, breaking up the chunk of frozen-together snow and scraping it aside, “Definitely wasn’t just us. Most of ‘em had the same idea we did, actually, just…”  
“Try and ignore it?”  
“Yeah, yeah!”  
  
Then...Maxie glanced down at what Archie was poking at with his shovel. And had a lightbulb moment.  
“Speaking of,” he wondered aloud, “...did you find that pen?”  
“Which one?”  
“The one I...er, threw out the window,” Maxie explained sheepishly, kicking at the scattered icy mush, “I swear it landed around here - it’s bright red,” he kept explaining, kneeling down to get a better look, “and it can’t have just - oh, I don’t know, _disappeared_ alto...gether…”  
  
“...Oh.”  
“ _Ah._ ”  
  
“Some Hoothoot must’ve stolen it,” Archie suggested, as they both turned _right_ around and walked back to the house, hand in hand.  
“Oh yes, that’d make sense,” Maxie decided with a quiet _harrumph_ , “...I hope it’s happy.”  
  
  


**Author's Note:**

> hey, so...i only realised when i started writing this oneshot that this...probably fits way too well with recent events - originally this was just meant to be funny, but then it turned into something else and... i hope everyone reading feels okay now, even if you are self-isolating right now.  
> as for me, i don't know what to feel - it feels a bit like all the news is happening too fast for me to keep up, but what can I do other than get comfortable, right?
> 
> i love you all. and this whole end note is probably going to look really weird if you're reading this in a year's time <3


End file.
